


I Will Not Stand

by 401



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Conditioning, Hydra (Marvel), M/M, Non-Sexual Submission, Pain, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-30
Updated: 2015-08-30
Packaged: 2018-04-18 04:25:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4691999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/401/pseuds/401
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'James Barnes had lost track of time.'</p><p>Bucky's time with the hydra handlers was hell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Will Not Stand

James Barnes had stopped keeping track of time. He had stopped trying as soon as he had sensed every second kneeling naked on a concrete floor becoming an hour, then a day, then some unmeasured stretch of discomfort that had no boundaries or borders. No thresholds between beginning and ends. There were no ends.

He had watched enough greasy looking men in white coats walk past the small scratched window at one end of his cell to know that none of them were thinking about him. He knew it was deliberate, too.

It was a conditioning exercise to make him lose value in human contact. He was starting to think it was working until one doctor walked past that made tears burn behind his nose. A shimmer of blonde had passed that dark window and temporarily fractured the grey, piss-smelling monotony of his surroundings. The memory of Steve came thick and fast, like a wave or a head-rush. The value was back and all he wanted was the feeling of warm hands, something to stop the cold, numb ache through his bones.

He had to kneel, his left arm was just a dulling stinging stump at his side, bandaged thickly and he was chained too close to the wall to lie down without risking falling onto his left side. If that happened, Bucky knew that the stinging would become considerably less dull. He wondered how long it would take for him to starve, pass out or stop feeling altogether. He would have settled for any of the three.

A man walked in. Short, thin, hair greased so desperately onto one side to cover a large plane of baldness on the top of his head that he looked like it had been spread on with a butter knife. He was wearing a black shirt with a Hydra pin on the left collar and his pants were perched high on his waist. He reminded Bucky of a pigeon; small, dirty but surprisingly cocky and brazen in a world full of big birds.

“You shall stand when your superior enters a room.”

Bucky went to ask how the hell he was supposed to do that but paused at the authority in the pigeon-man’s voice. It was becoming a reflex, subordination to the handlers. Bucky resented it greatly but he was starting to comply automatically.

He started to shift awkwardly.

“Yes, sir,” He grunted, trying to shift his dead knees forward enough.

He would instinctively go to use his left hand to push himself up only to be met with empty space and vertigo.

He managed to get into a squat before dizziness and sudden exhaustion hit him in the gut. He supressed a retch and shut his eyes tight as the burn of blood rushing to his feet coursed through him.

“On your FEET, asset!” The handler boomed, louder than Bucky had expected.

He pressed though the nausea until he was on his feet, unsteady but standing.

“Why are you here?” The small man asked, crossing his skinny arms across his chest.

Bucky knew this routine well.

“To bring control to society though my own subordination,” Bucky replied instantaneously.

“ _Why_ are you here?” The man repeated.

Bucky gave the same response, bolts of pain shooting through his left shoulder distractingly and making his stomach churn as he stared down at his own soot covered feet.

“Why are you here?” The man asked again.

A bolt of rage flew through Bucky’s veins.

“BECAUSE YOU _BASTARDS_ ARE KEEPING ME HERE!” he screamed, finally giving into agony and fatigue.

He winced through the impressively hard slap that met the side of his face.

“The Asset will not show untamed anger; only efficient brutality at the order of Hydra,” The handler recited, a sadistic grin spreading over his wet mouth and revealing a row of tobacco-stained teeth.

Bucky sighed letting himself crumble back onto his knees.

“You shall stand…”

“No,” Bucky interrupted, quietly with his nose against the concrete, “No, I will not stand for you.”  


Bucky heard a grunt of frustration from the man, followed by a wave of sickening and electric pain as he drove one of his over-shined dress shoes into what was left of Bucky’s left shoulder, stepping on it with most of his weight.

Bucky did not even attempt to stifle the scream that tore through him. It curdled in his lungs and echoed off of the concrete walls. The scream turned to coughs and retches as the handler increased the pressure of his foot.

“You are right,” the handler muttered, “You will not stand.”

Bucky closed his eyes as flow after flow of pain pulsed through his shoulder, radiating across his whole left side until the handler finally let go, kicking Bucky in the chest so he rolled onto his back and sobbed silently.

 

“I hope you will have seen sense by the morning, Agent,” The pigeon-man chuckled.

Bucky stared at the ceiling with tear-addled vision, losing himself in the lack of clarity.

“Can’t,” Bucky whispered, “I took too much stupid with me.”

 


End file.
